“I don’t mind,” said Sir Alan. “Two or three hours in bed are enough for me at any time. Please pass the spirit case, Jones. I wonder you’re not sleepy, Tom Everton. You used always to be in bed by eleven when you had an early morning in prospect, but I suppose matrimony has cured you of that along with other failings.”
“Tom says he isn’t going,” some one remarked.
“Not going! Pooh, nonsense! I thought he’d made up his mind to bring down a hart royal, at least, or leave his bones on Balmaquidder Brae.”
Mr. Everton looked decidedly uncomfortable.
“I—I should like to try of all things,” he stammered, “but—well—I won’t—at least I think—I—I shan’t go with you to-morrow—that is, if Sir Alan will excuse me.”
“Please yourself and you’ll please me,” replied the hospitable baronet; “but if it isn’t any secret I’d like to know what has made you change your mind so suddenly.”
“He promised Mrs. Everton he wouldn’t go,” broke in the previous speaker. “She dreamed a dream, and, like Pharaoh’s chief baker, she thought there was something in it.”
“Do be quiet, Jones,” interrupted Everton, irritably. “My wife had a rather odd dream last night, and she’s a bit nervous, you know, and—well, after all, it’s not much to give up one day’s deer-stalking, if any one’s going to make herself miserable over it.”
We all knew each other pretty well, this little circle of guests collected by Sir Alan to help him to shoot his Scotch mountain, and very free and outspoken was the “chaff” that flew around poor Tom Everton’s devoted head. He bore it with great good-humor for some time, till Jones made a rather uncalled-for remark involving questions of free will and “petticoat government.” Then Tom flared up.
“I don’t stay at home because I’m afraid of anything, but simply because I have promised. My wife dreamed that I went out with this party, and it grew late without any of us coming back. Then she thought she saw me lying face down in the Balmaquidder, and she seemed to know I was dead. I don’t remember the details, but I know she worked herself up into a shocking nervous state about it till I promised not to go. Of course it’s all nonsense, I know that, but what can I do?”